New gun law is overly restrictive and not about education
After viewing the new law passed in 2025 against American citizens who wish to buy semiautomatic firearms, I have a few questions about Senate Bill 3. The Specified Semiautomatic Firearms permit requires what is called a “firearms safety course eligibility card.”
The “permit” curriculum is standardized, with no variation allowed. The classes must be a specific length of time — not allowed to finish early or run long. Why?
Why is there no time limit on how long it takes for a sheriff to approve the permit? No additional funding was made available to sheriffs’ departments; were the authors of the bill shortsighted, or was this part of the plan to discourage firearms ownership?
There was a vague reference to “third party background check” with no explanation or list of approved vendors. Again, why?
There is no response to these questions from the sponsors (Tom Sullivan, Julie Gonzales, Andrew Boesenecker, Meg Froelich) beyond uncertainty, i.e. “It’s in the bill.” No, it isn’t, “I don’t know.”
Lastly, and perhaps the most important aspect (to me): if the state legislature is really concerned about firearms safety, why not mandatory basic firearms safety courses in middle or high schools? I spoke to several certified trainers who would happily teach for free, but the local city council said no. Wouldn’t it make sense since anti-rights groups claim that accidents with firearms are a major concern?
Lance Touve, Longmont
City overcomplicates everything — this time it’s trash carts
I recently needed to replace my 96-gallon black trash cart after a neighborhood squirrel chewed a hole through the lid and started eating my garbage.
Since I don’t own a truck, I loaded the old stinking cart into my SUV, rolled down every window, and hoped I wouldn’t throw up before reaching the city facility at South Osage Street.
When I arrived, I learned the City of Denver has stopped allowing residents to exchange damaged carts at the facility.
Apparently, as of July 1, taxpayers must request a replacement online, wait for the request to be processed, and leave the damaged cart outside until a city crew decides it has time to deliver another one.
Why make a simple service so complicated?
Denver homeowners already pay a trash pickup fee. Does the city not have enough personnel to operate the exchange and storage facility on Osage? Is it more efficient to send a separate crew and truck to every home instead of allowing taxpayers to bring damaged carts to one central location?
I went inside and found a city employee who explained he could not simply exchange my cart, even though I had already hauled it there. He did, however, submit a replacement request for me.
I sincerely appreciate that employee. He did what he could within a system that seems determined to make an easy task unnecessarily difficult.
Needless to say, it was another long, hot, stinky drive home with my old trash can.
What is happening to the City of Denver?
Gregg S. Hayutin, Denver
No sympathy for a man wanted in Belize
Re: “Locked inside ICE,” July 5 opinion column
I started reading the Brady Tillett piece in Sunday’s Perspective section with little more than a cursory interest and because of the subtitle alluding to his being inside an ICE facility for the past two years.
Was this an undercover journalist engaging in a deep dive of our immigration detention system? No, as it turns out. When I read his statement, “we should also remove the punitive policies that criminalize the very act of migration,” I thought, he must be an American citizen who somehow has been improperly detained. The answer to that is no.
It turns out, Tillett is neither a journalist nor an American citizen. In his words, he was here seeking asylum, “fleeing persecution” from his home country of Belize. Never mind logic would dictate he seek asylum in other nearby nations such as Barbados, Dominica, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, where the citizens of Belize enjoy unfettered rights to travel, work, and reside.
Or, he could have sought asylum in neighboring Mexico or Guatemala, both bordering Belize.
Did he not know to claim asylum at the U.S. border would result in mandatory federal detention?
Regardless, there is a major issue with his claim for asylum; he’s one of the five “most wanted” fugitives in Belize. Authorities there say he is wanted on aggravated assault charges for allegedly participating in an attempt on the life of Police Commissioner Chester Williams.
His current incarceration is due to attempts to have him extradited back to Belize, although Tillett would have us believe he is a victim of an unjust immigration system. One must wonder why The Denver Post Editorial Board would reprint such an article.
David Oyler, Canon City
We all want healthy forests! Fund their management
Re: “As Colorado burns, blame dead standing trees and climate change,” July 2 letter to the editor
We foresters, for decades, have been encouraging those who control the purse strings to fund the management of our forests (private, federal, and others). Managing our forests for health and reduced fire threat. When you manage for the health of the forest, including letting fires burn (way too late for that now), you have reduced fire threat.
If we continue to just fund fire suppression … we lose our forests for good. If you want our forests to look like Europe’s (plantations of trees with no diversity), that is where we are headed.
I saw a recent letter to The Post from Ouray to get with it and start creating defensible spaces. Our federal agencies should not be fire suppression agencies. They should manage as they were originally set up to do!
As all of us continue to build in the woodlands and near fire-prone areas, don’t scream about higher insurance costs and tell the firefighters to keep you safe and your homes intact. When we recently lost 3 firefighters, that is totally unacceptable!
Managing our public lands has become politicized, just like everything else. Our natural lands are just as important to our survival as cheap gas and groceries!
Speak up and out.
Jim McGannon, Denver
To send a letter to the editor about this article, submit online or check out our guidelines for how to submit by email or mail.
